Cloud computing and innovation are intrinsically linked in the federal government. The idea of agencies moving commodity technology such as email or collaboration to the cloud begets their ability to be more innovative with both commodity and mission critical IT.

The Department of Defense is in the midst of a large-scale revamping of its information infrastructure. The Joint Information Environment (JIE) promises to facilitate information sharing among the military services, other government stakeholders, and coalition partners. And it will do so while consolidating resources at a time of budgetary challenges. In this edition of AFCEA Answers, DOD Deputy CIO David DeVries offers a progress report on the JIE, and hints at how they will inevitably measure success. Also: a preview of the upcoming AFCEA JIE Mission Partner Symposium, May 12 - 14 in Baltimore.

As recently as a decade ago, enterprise services was seen as a way to cut costs and provide more efficient data and telephone services to civilian offices. But now, with the rise of the Pentagon's Joint Information Environment, enterprise services is taking on a new role in providing tactical information advantage to warfighters in the field, and business opportunities to industry capable of providing both the hardware and software to make it happen.

Joining us to talk about it on this edition of "AFCEA Answers" is David DeVries, Deputy Chief Information Officer for Information Enterprise, Department of Defense.

GSA, NIST to name the first batch of outside organizations who will test and validate commercial cloud products against baseline security standards in the FedRAMP cloud security program in May. The Joint Authorization Board also will release guidance to industry on how to implement the security requirements in the coming months. FedRAMP still is months from approving its first set of vendors.